Hue Jackson loves to talk. To just about anyone. Wandering through the Bengals’ locker room, he’ll stop to chat with a player. He’ll dip off and converse with a coach. He’ll interject himself into a discussion just to slip a joke in on a group a linemen.

Only, until Monday, when the Bengals’ voluntary offseason program began at Paul Brown Stadium, when Jackson walked by a player working out in the weight room, he would often look the other way, his mouth shut.

Silence. Because the NFL told him to.

“I say hello, how you doing,” Jackson said. “Sometimes I don’t say anything because I don’t want one thing to lead to another.”

The new collective bargaining agreement agreed to in 2011 dictates that until the offseason program begins, players and coaches are not allowed to talk football, hold meetings, look at a playbook, watch film or do any other football-related activity. Players can’t work out with the team strength coach even if he’s standing at the bench press next to him.

“That’s weird because they are here and they are available for us to use, but we can’t use them,” defensive end Carlos Dunlap said. “So, basically, they are training the coaches.”

Dunlap joked and laughed at the concept of coaches sculpting their “beach bodies” under the supervision of the strength and conditioning staff. But of late, these rules elicited little laughter across the league.

At the league meetings in Orlando in February, Baltimore coach John Harbaugh unleashed on the system that keeps coaches from working with developing players motivated to get a jump on the next season.

“The management council and the players association have got to get together and help us as organizations and coaches help our young players develop as people and players,” Harbaugh said, via Jamison Hensley of ESPN. “I mean, come on. You hold us responsible and want us to be a factor in their lives like the mentoring program and things like that. Give us a chance.”

Teams with new coaches can start their program two weeks earlier than those with a returning head coach. The Bengals started April 21.

These rules altered the schedule of the previous offseason programs because players wanted to avoid coaches constantly pushing conditioning, film study and other football activities on them during a break from the rigors of the season. This would leave an opportunity for going back to school or just feeling safe away from the building without thinking they are falling behind.

Wide receiver A.J. Green keeps his reps if he doesn’t spend extra time poring over film with his position coach. Veteran left tackle Andrew Whitworth doesn’t need to spend extra time in March picking the brain of offensive line coach Paul Alexander.

For veterans, these rules make sense and avoid any confusion. The point of Harbaugh and many coaches across the league would be that hundreds of undrafted free agents, late-round draft picks or developmental prospects who have not cashed in on a large contract and search for any way to raise their level of play are being denied such an opportunity.

“They want to prove to their teammates and peers that they belong,” Jackson said. “They don’t want to go out there the first time and not look like they know what they are doing. By not having specified coaching earlier than most, they don’t get a chance to do that.

“The guys that do are very special and they hit the ground running and they play. The guys that don’t, it’s not because they can’t play, it’s because maybe they need the extra time to learn the system. That’s tough for those guys.”

For the Bengals, with new coordinators Jackson and Paul Guenther, a chance to check in with players about possible changes to the systems or to gauge reaction to ideas would go a long way. Instead, they waited until this week to go over their months of work.

The conversations stay simple.

“We just talk about how has everything been, how you feeling and how is training? That’s pretty much it,” said wide receiver Marvin Jones, who spent the majority of the offseason at his home in Burlington, Ky., and working out at PBS.

Harbaugh led the charge for the NFLPA and the league to come together to find solutions to a rule he blames on politics. As of now, nothing appears on the horizon.

For Jackson, the thrill of talking football with whoever crosses his path has returned. And it couldn’t come soon enough.

“You have to be OK with it because 31 other teams are facing the same dilemma,” Jackson said. “At the end of the day there are rules that are established for a reason. There are league-wide rules and you have to follow them. Everyone understands them and respects them. Do we all wish they were different? Yeah.

“The players that are there and want to get better, you wish you could talk to them and do the things that will help make them a better football player, but at the end of the day you got to do the right thing.” ■